Playing with the Shavian Alphabet

Recently I discovered the Shavian alphabet, and have passed a few days
playing with it. One result is an Emacs Mule input method, which I
developed for this alphabet.

My first intention was to apply the familiar SAMPA ASCIIzation; yet in
order to simplify the input I have made a few modifications.

In order to avoid frequent upcasing in I, aI, eI, I use the ee
digraph for [i:] (i.e. 𐑰), thus freeing i for [ɪ] (i.e. 𐑦). Hence I
can use the simpler ei, ai etc combinations. The same holds for oo
and u instead of the SAMPA's u and U (and hence the simpler au,
ou).

Similarly, y is used for [j] (i.e. 𐑘, yea), so that the “deep” letter
j can be used for [dʒ] (judge, 𐑡); and the “tall” upper-case J becomes
the unvoiced [tʃ] (church, 𐑗).

Most ligatures are the normal SAMPA combinations:

are [ɑr] Ar → 𐑸 ;

Or → 𐑹 [ɔr], [ɔər] or

array [ər] @r → 𐑼 ;

i@r - 𐑽 [ɪər], ear

Ian [i.ə] i@ → 𐑾,

etc.

If for some strange reason you have to avoid merging a combination
into a single Shavian letter, you can enter and erase a space between
the combining characters; that will break the sequence, and the inputs
shall be disjoint. E.g.

A SPC BS r

shall input two consecutive letters 𐑭𐑮, not a single are ligature (𐑸).

The input method module is available here: shavian-ucs.el. Put it
somewhere in your Elisp load-path hierarchy; and evaluate (add in your
.emacs) the method specification:

You can choose an input method by C-x C-M C-\; thereafter you shall
be able to toggle the input methods by C-\.

There are several Unicode fonts for the Shavian alphabet.
Unfortunately none of them has kerning for the Shavian part, and most
use the stingy interword spacing traditional in the English-language
typography (0.3 em, which is too narrow; the Russian norm is
0.5 em). In this situation monospaced fonts could be more readable
than the proportional ones.

I also like to play with the esperantic version of the project, la Ŝava alfabeto.

Below is the result of an input exercise I used to check my input method.

𐑸𐑑𐑦𐑒𐑩𐑤 1 𐑝 𐑞 ·𐑿𐑯𐑦𐑝𐑻𐑕𐑩𐑤 𐑛𐑧𐑒𐑤𐑩𐑮𐑱𐑖𐑩𐑯 𐑝 𐑣𐑿𐑥𐑩𐑯 𐑮𐑲𐑑𐑕

(All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They
are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one
another in a spirit of brotherhood. Article 1 of the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights.)